My first introduction to the quality of a Dicomed product came while I was scouring the library of the National Museum of Japan for information on digital imaging equipment. In the German magazine fotomagazin, for January of 1995, they did a test on all high end digital cameras. The Dicomed got the highest rating.
I subsequently had an opportunity to visit the Dicomed corporate headquarters in Minneapolis, and was impressed by the quality of all their products. Other people I have spoken with about digital cameras have also held Dicomed in high regard.
F.L.A.A.R. sincerely appreciates Dicomed providing a Field Pro digital photography system to use in Guatemala and Honduras.
The photographs resulting from this Dicomed Field Pro digital camera system now fill ten different web sites.
Unfortunately Dicomed spent too much time trying to promote its BigShot for medium format systems. A great concept but it failed in the market place. In the process of spending too much time with BigShot, Dicomed sort of forgot to do adequate PR for their Studio Pro and FieldPro large format scan backs. In hindsight the Studio Pro and FieldPro proved to be the digital better camera systems.
The Dicomed StudioPro and FieldPro scan backs for 4x5 inch large format cameras were actually made by Michael Collette of BetterLight. Dicomed still honors the maintenance agreements and warranty obligations (a credit to their corporate ethics). But all actual maintenance is done by BetterLight, since, after all, it was Michael Collette who build them.
My FieldPro has thousands of miles of rough travel and several years of use but has never needed to be repaired or even get any kind of help other than basic cleaning (I work near active volcanos and in an area of constant earthquakes).
Recently Calumet Digital Solutions sent a new model Super6000 BetterLight 4x5 digital scan back and a Cambo Ultima 4x5 inch large format camera to hold the scanning back. We will be evaluating this 4x5 digital photography equipment in Guatemala this summer. Check back to the F.L.A.A.R. network of web sites for the results, especially on www.digital-photography.org, www.cameras-scanners-flaar.org and www.maya-archaeology.org.